Interventional medical procedures are increasingly relied upon to treat patients suffering from coronary artery disease or cardiac ischemia. In particular, such patients may be treated using vascular bypass operations such as Coronary Artery Bypass Graft (CABG), or less invasive techniques. Less invasive techniques may include one or more of angioplasty or stenting, which can be referred to generally as Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI), or atherectomy, brachytherapy, or one or more other techniques. Such less invasive techniques often include introduction of one or more catheters or guidewires into the vasculature. Similar approaches can be used for treating various symptoms or diseases involving other physiologic locations (e.g., a biliary location, a carotid artery location, or one or more other locations). Various imaging techniques can provide useful feedback to a caregiver before, during, or after an intravascular or intraluminal procedure. Such imaging techniques can include X-ray (e.g., fluoroscopy) or ultrasound-based techniques.
Vardi and Spivak, U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,659,957, 7,527,594, and U.S. Pat. Pub. No. US-2008-0119739-A1, each of which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety, describe, among other things, an elongated imaging apparatus, for internal patient imaging, the apparatus including an electrical-to-acoustic transmit transducer and an acoustic-to-optical receive transducer.
Bates and Vardi, U.S. Pat. No. 7,245,789, 7,447,388, 7,660,492, 8,059,923, and U.S. Pat. Pub. No. US-2012-0108943-A1, each of which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety, describe, among other things, an elongated imaging apparatus, for internal patient imaging, the apparatus including an optical-to-acoustic transmit transducer and an acoustic-to-optical receive transducer.